Divide by three

I experienced the mild disappointment of "aww, I've already had it" when I set about writing a review of this can of Great Divide Denver Pale Ale. It showed up previously in this post back in 2011. But! Further research indicates that they changed the recipe in 2016 so I think it's fair game to call it a new beer.

The original tasted of honey, biscuits and fresh fruit, according to me. The new one doesn't. There's a lot of candy in both the aroma and taste: chew sweets, and Refreshers in particular. Throw in some frangipane spongecake as well. Despite this, the texture is light and crisp, feeling less than its 5% ABV and with a pleasingly sharp bite of classic American-hop grapefruit. It's contrast more than balance, but it still works. The can was over six months old by the time I opened it, and it retained an impressive amount of freshness. This is a fun beer, packed with flavour yet accessible and sessionable. Can't say fairer than.

The next one is a bit of a comedy of errors. Hop Disciples is an IPA of 6.2% ABV, part of a "rotating hop project" "featuring a different hop variety every year". Nowhere on the can does it say which hop is actually featuring. *shrug*. The point may be moot, however. I knew this had been in my fridge a while, but not indecently long. However, I may have purchased an antique when I bought it in Stephen Street News as it had clocked up fourteen months in the can by the time I opened it. Ooops. Fermentation may have been chuntering on during that as I got a lot of foam when I poured it. The body is a dark and hazy orange. There's a vague aroma of nondescript diluted citrus drink. The flavour is still good, though. A big malt base stands it in good stead: orange jelly and apricot jam come to mind. Any airier hop high-notes have departed but there's a fun clove or nutmeg spicing. I feared a harsh bitterness but that's not present and it remains balanced. This is no longer an American hop explosion, if ever it was, but it's not too far from a pale English or Belgian strong ale, and as such still very decent drinking.

Sticking with IPA but bringing the ABV up to 8% we have Hopnaut, described in a suspiciously on-trend way as a "double juicy IPA". Let's see about that. It's funny how "juicy" has led to an expectation of haze, even though it doesn't imply that and there's barely any here. The aroma is passably juicy, however, if shading a little to sticky boiled sweets. It definitely doesn't taste like a modern hazeboi: there's real old-fashioned crystal malt sweetness, with a generous squeeze of contrasting lime citrus and a balancing tannic dryness. This is how I remember American double IPAs tasting, back when I first started tasting them. And because my tastes have changed, if not necessarily in the direction of beer fashion, I really quite like it. There's a sizeable booze quotient too, as well as a thick texture, which together make this one to sip and savour. It's not easy going and I'm sure it isn't meant to be. I'm all on board for sneaking ballsy C-hop bitterness into the diet of juice-bomb aficionados, and while I enjoyed that practical joke, I enjoyed drinking this beer even more. Big hops as your grandpappy drank them, in 2008.

Some solid work by Great Divide here, and a nice demolition of the notion that hoppy beer has to be brewery-fresh to be worth drinking.

Stateside classics

Rounding up the American beer evening that Reuben hosted a while back with three breweries whose stuff really stood out.

I've already covered a few from Great Divide, though I was surprised on checking back that I've never had their Titan IPA before -- I guess Hercules, the double IPA, occupies a similar space in my head. It's been my loss too as this is great stuff: that classic sherbet character of US IPA finishing with an intense oily bitterness that really wakes up the palate. Dialling the hops back but keeping the sherbet there's Samurai, brewed with rice. It's a suitably pale yellow but is no dull watery cheap-tasting guzzler. Lots of zesty lemon flavours leap out of the glass and the body is remarkably full, given the look of the thing. Lots of fizz, on the downside, but still a quality beer.

Somewhere between these two comes Denver Pale Ale. Aroma of biscuits and fresh fruit, with honey added into the mix on tasting. It's a smooth and mellow ale, worth taking time over. As is the Great Divide porter Saint Bridget's (we'll pass discreetly over the trucker's mudflap of a label). It's absolutely packed with rich and warming chocolate flavours, to the point of seeming almost powdery.

Next up a brewery I had never heard of before: Lazy Magnolia of Mississippi: the Magnolia State, dontcherknow. Indian Summer promised more than it gave. Yes it's a wheat beer, but there's more than the average amount of coriander and orange peel in here giving it some lovely light botanicals on the nose. The taste is oddly sour, however: a throwback to when Hoegaarden was spontaneously fermented, perhaps? Anyway, when the label says "Spiced Ale" I expect a bit more welly.

Such shortcomings were more than made up for by the other offer from Lazy Magnolia: Southern Pecan. It's banoffi as beer: heavy, sweet yet deliciously moreish with lots of biscuits and brown sugar, plus the pecans, of course. Easily the best American brown ale I've ever met.

Finally, to a brewery particularly close to our host's heart and one whose beers he particularly wanted to introduce us to: Bell's of Kalamazoo. The sunny orange and turquoise branding of Oberon is entirely appropriate. Another wheat beer, this one shows lots of light and breezy fruit, with candied orange in the driving seat. It's fun and dangerously easy drinking at 5.8% ABV -- that's going to sneak up on you pretty quickly, I reckon.

The brewery's IPA is called Two Hearted making it, as far as I know, the only commercial beer in existence named in tribute to Doctor Who. A whopping 7% ABV would suggest that this is an all-American badboy, but my impressions were more those of the better class of British IPA. It's that balance of bitter marmalade on a big toasted grain body, perhaps finishing a tiny bit soapy or metallic that has me recalling White Shield and Bengal Lancer. It's a comfortable and balanced beer: hopped up and powerfully strong, of course, but gentle and reassuring with it.

Enough beers for one afternoon's drinking? Time to grab the last bus back to the big smoke? Oh just a pint from the kegerator for the road, then...

Thanks to Adam and Richard for bringing along beers and for the company, and a massive thank you to Reuben and Hilary for a great day out and one hell of a virtual tour of American breweries both great and small.